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The story is gripping and the writing, excellent as usual but I'm getting very sick of reading about this almost sub-human strata of society. Two events occur which start a cycle of unstoppable violence.A young girl goes missing and a blabbermouth social worker lets it be known that a convicted paedophile is housed on the same working class estate, which is so badly designed that it forms a bottle neck, limiting entrance and entrance.An attractive young female doctor is called to the house of the paedophile to treat his ailing father and is held captive by them.When a group of women on the estate hold a march to protest about the presence of the paedophile, yobs take over and start to fire bomb the house where he is living. In the ensueing violence, several people are killed and a number of them injured in the panic to escape the streets. It's gripping reading but certainly not pretty and I find it difficult to work up much sympathy for these misfits of society who exist on public hand-outs.

A young girl, Amy, goes missing, around the same time it is revealed that a paedophile is living in the housing estate from which she disappeared. The people come out in force to protest at his presence. Slowly, the protests bud into riots, stretching the police force, breeding greater and greater acts of violence. The streets of "Bassindale Row" (dubbed "Acid Row" by its inhabitants) are thronged with angry citizens, some well-meaning, and some there just to further incite destruction. Events build to a crescendo, as the troubled housing estate is swept under the tide of a crowd whose slogan is "Saving Amy"...But, the rioters are unaware of the presence of Sophie Morrison, a young doctor called to the house of the "pervert" just before events erupted. Now she is trapped inside with a man she increasingly comes to believe is capable of great violence...Minette Walters continues in the vein of her last book, bringing forth a novel once again full of deep social perception. This time, she writes about the events which recently swept Great Britain, with all the furore of exposing paedophiles, and the doubled-edged sword that doing so would unsheathe.The first thirty pages or so are just typical Walters. Accurate psychology, deep prose, great characters, realism in the writing, etc. However, once the riots begin, the book gets swept away with the pace. It moves too quickly. Character development, which was building so brilliantly at first, is sacrificed, and several of the characters introduced later on in the story come across as cardboard and cliched. The excitement of the events just takes the book too quickly. It does make it a great pageturner, yes. And i am sure that fact will win it praise, but at the expense of plot and character development, I'm not certain it's worth it.Read more ›

This was my first Walters book -- and I was very impressed! I would never have thought that reading about a riot could be so fascinating! And, also very disturbing... The way the plot is put together is very clever. It's like trying to pull apart a bunch of threads all mixed up together. I'm not that familiar with the state of affairs in the British society but, the lazy arrogant youth and bullies described in this book abound here in our major urban centres in Canada and the USA. Reading this book was like witnessing what would happen if your own fears materialized. The cast of characters was very well developed -- some you liked, some you loathed but none left you indifferent. It was stunning to see how the author managed to keep me keenly interested until the very end -- which, for once, was quite good and resolving. It's a very well written book, with great dialogues and a steady/simmering pace. I give it 4 stars out of 5.

Society breaks down in a housing project and a peaceful demonstration gets completely out of hand, as we follow the fate of a young woman doctor trapped inside a house with its inhabitants and a little girl who is missing.While this was not exactly what I was expecting, once I got into it, I couldn't put it down. Walters is a master of character and suspense, which is a powerful combination that keeps the pages turning as if they had a mind of their own. There are multiple story lines, each as spellbinding as the last.I do love Minette Walters other books, specifically Ice House, The Sculptress and Shape of Snakes. While this is not my favorite of the Walters book, I give it four out of five stars. If you haven't read any other of Walters' books, you may want to start with one of the other three, I just mentioned.

Walters is a truly fantastic writer. This book treats the themes of poverty, prejudice, and the inevitable assumptions we make about each others actions and motivations. It deals with all of this through a non-stop, action - filled plot in which the search for a missing ten year old girl is juxtaposed with a deadly riot. I am amazed by the way in which Walters can create characters and settings that are so real and so rich. The only way to describe this book is 'compelling'. I was quite literally on the edge of my seat while I was reading. The subject matter is dark and unpleasant, but once you pick up this book, you will have a hard time putting it down.